


Naming Rights

by spatialvoid



Category: Gilmore Girls
Genre: Gen, post- A Year in the Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-01
Updated: 2016-12-01
Packaged: 2018-09-03 11:52:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,231
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8712664
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spatialvoid/pseuds/spatialvoid
Summary: “You know, I don't think they really use Demerol now, you're going to have to come up with a better excuse for your feminism just taking over like that.”

Rory moves onward.
Post- Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Rated T for profanity.

_“Mom?”_

_“Yeah?”_

_“I’m pregnant.”_

Her mother is silent for what feels like an eternity.

“Are you sure?” She finally asks. “Did you go to the doctor? Pee on a stick? Get poked with a needle?”

“I’m sure."

Lorelai looks stricken, and it makes Rory’s stomach churn even more than it already was. “Whose is it? Paul’s… or… or Logan’s? Someone else's entirely?”

Rory just nods morosely. She’s not sure what else to say.

“Oh, Rory….”

She takes a deep breath. “Just… say what you’re going to say, get it over with. I’m sure you’re upset - _I’m_ upset! I’m furious! I can’t believe this! And I’m….” She falters.

“Terrified?”

“That’s the word.”

“Oh, Rory,” her mother says again. Her voice is soft and sad and it reminds Rory a little bit too much of standing by her open bedroom door while Lorelai eyed her unmade bed with grief in her eyes.

“Mom?” She sounds meek and frightened even in her own ears.

“I love you, kid,” Lorelai tells her. “Nothing will ever, ever change that. This isn’t ideal, I’m not going to gloss over that. You’re a grown-up, you can handle it. And the fact of the matter is that you’ve just hopped onto the hard-decisions train and it’s not gonna let you off again. But it’s all in what you make of it.” She smiles, that winning Lorelai Gilmore smile that makes even Rory go weak at the knees. “And sometimes, you make something really great.”

* * *

“So you told him.” She’s extraordinarily calm, and it’s putting Rory even more on edge than she already was. “What’d he say?”

Rory rolls her eyes. “He said, ‘Like mother, like daughter,’” she tells her mother, making air quotes with her fingers.

Lorelai snorts. “Seriously?”

She nods. “And then he offered child support, and I said, ‘It’s kind of you to offer,’ and then he said, ‘I don't wanna upend my life,’ and then I said, ‘Neither do I, but I don't get much of a choice, do I?’ and he said, ‘I guess not.’ And then we hung up.”

Lorelai sighs. “So what are you gonna do?”

“I guess… what every other Lorelai Gilmore before me has done.”

“You’re okay with that?”

Rory shrugs. “I think I have to be.”

* * *

"Oh, shit,” Lane says. “Damn. Wow. Okay. God. Hold on, I need to wrap my head around this for a second.”

Rory takes a deep breath. “You and me both, sister.”

“So you're pregnant?”

“Yes.”

“With…?”

“Uh huh.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah.”

“Are you freaking out?”

“Is that even a question?”

Lane laughs nervously. “Sorry. Right. Of course you're freaking out! I would be freaking out! In fact, I have done my fair share of freaking out.”

“And you were married! I'm not married! I don't even have a steady job - I'm writing a book! I'm going to have to move back in with Mom and Luke while I finish it, and I don't know when I'm going to be done!”

“Yeah,” Lane says, “but I was twenty-two. And it was twins.”

Rory feels herself pale. “Oh, god! What if it's twins!”

“You have Lorelai,” Lane tells her. “And we all know your relationship with her is a thousand times better than my mother and I’s.”

“Yeah.” Rory folds her hands in her lap. “I do.”

Lane’s brow furrows. “Is something going on between you and her?”

Rory shakes her head. “No, no. She’s just very… I don’t know.”

“Sounds to me like you _do_ know,” Lane prods. “You’re just not sure how to say it.”

Even after all this time, Lane still knows her better than almost anyone. “I think she’s happy for me, I really do, but I also… I know her. And I know that as fun as it was when it was just the two of us, it was really hard for her. I don’t think she wanted that for me.”

“This isn’t about what Lorelai wants for you, though,” Lane says wisely. “It’s about what _you_ want for you.”

Rory’s eyes well with tears. “God, I’m being so stupid,” she mumbles, wiping at her eyes with the sleeve of her sweater.

“You are many things,” Lane tells her, “but stupid isn’t one of them.”

Rory shakes her head. “I keep trying to tell myself that I have time to decide, that I don’t have to know what I want just yet. That… I can want something different, that it doesn’t make me… less than. But instead all I can think about is how, when I graduated high school, I had to write this speech. It was so long ago, and I don’t remember most of it, but I do remember standing up in front of everyone and talking about my mom. And I remember saying that I didn’t know if she realized that the person I most wanted to be, out of anyone in the world, fictional or real, was her.”

“And it's still true,” Lane says cautiously.

Rory nods. “Still true,” she whispers, her eyes shining.

* * *

“A boy.” Rory feels shell-shocked, if this is what shell-shocked feels like. She stares blankly at the ultrasound technician. “But I’m a Gilmore!”

“I’m not really sure that has anything to do with it,” Lorelai says from beside her.

“I don’t know how to be a mother to a _boy_!”

“As opposed to what?” Her mother quips. “Rosemary’s baby?”

Rory looks at her mother. “You know what I mean.”

Lorelai stares back at her. “I’m not sure I do.”

The ultrasound tech stands up. “I’m just… gonna give you ladies a minute.”

Once she leaves, Rory folds her hands over her growing abdomen. “Lorelai Gilmore has a daughter,” she tells her mother. “I am also Lorelai Gilmore. Shouldn’t I have a daughter? I don't know what to do with a boy! You can’t cry over _Sleepless in Seattle_ with a son!”

“Sure you can,” Lorelai says. “Makes Luke cry, every time, and he’s never gotten a visit from Aunt Flo.” She pauses. “Besides, you’re not the first Lorelai Gilmore to have ever had a son.”

“But I don’t know how to do this! _You_ don’t know how to do this, and you know how to handle everything! This is uncharted territory!”

Her mother just looks at her with that patented maternal look of empathy and love. “Rory?”

“Yeah?”

“ _You_ were uncharted territory.” She squeezes Rory's hand. “And I think things worked out pretty okay.”

“But I'm here,” Rory whispers, feeling extraordinarily small. “I fucked up, Mom.”

Lorelai's eyes narrow. “You did _not_ fuck up,” she tells Rory. “You didn't. Life took you in an unexpected direction under less-than-ideal circumstances, but you did _not_ fuck up.”

“You think so?” Rory asks weakly. She’s having a little trouble persuading herself that that’s the case.

Lorelai gives her a melancholy smile. “I _know_ so. Like mother, like daughter, remember?”

* * *

“I don't know what to name a boy,” Rory tells her mother. They’re sitting on the sofa, watching one of the many Lifetime movies cluttering the DVR while they wait for Luke to finish dinner.

Lorelai chuckles. “What were you gonna name a girl? Lorelai?” She looks over at Rory, who's not feeling particularly amused. She pauses the TV. “Oh my god, you were going to name the baby Lorelai.”

Rory doesn’t say anything.

“Oh, my god.” Lorelai's to the point of full-on hysterical laughter now. She points at Rory. “You were gonna name the baby Lorelai!”

“How is that funny?”

“You know, I don't think they really use Demerol now, you're going to have to come up with a better excuse for your feminism just taking over like that.”

“Mom!”

“Hey, Luke!” Lorelai yells into the kitchen. “Rory was gonna name the baby Lorelai!”

Luke appears in the hall, drying his hands on a dish towel, eyebrows raised. “Isn't he a _boy_?”

“That's the word on the street,” Lorelai tells him.

“Huh,” Luke says, looking at Rory and shaking his head in a rather fatherly fashion. “Well, you’ve always been unconventional.”

“I'm not naming him Lorelai!” Rory huffs. “I don't know what I'm going to name him, but it's not going to be Lorelai!”

“Yeah, your grandmother would really hate that,” Luke replies.

A mischievous smile takes over Lorelai's face. “Hey, maybe you _should_ name him Lorelai!”

“I am not naming my son Lorelai!”

“Well, Rory _is_ technically a boy’s name….”

“Oh my god!”

* * *

“What'll it be, kid?”

“God,” Rory groans, “all I want is a cup of coffee.”

Luke points at her burgeoning belly. “You can't. You're pregnant. I want my grandson to come out with _one_ head.”

“More to love?”

He pulls a coffee pot from the machine and holds it in front of her. “Decaf?”

“Fine,” she mumbles.

“Listen,” Luke says, pouring her coffee, “I've got something for you upstairs, I'm gonna go run and get it.”

Rory's eyes narrow. “I thought you abandoned the old apartment.”

Luke puts the coffee pot back on the machine. “I did. But where else am I supposed to hide gifts from your mom?”

Rory laughs. “Touché.”

He touches her hand. “Be right back.”

A few moments later, Luke sets a brown paper gift bag in front of her on the counter. There's blue tissue paper peeking out of the top.

“I know Lane’s gone all-out with the baby shower planning,” Luke says, “but I'm not going to be able to be here that weekend because I'd already made plans to visit April, so… I thought I'd just give you the gift I got now.”

“Wow,” Rory says. “Thanks, Luke.”

“I couldn't get him anything monogrammed,” Luke tells her, “‘cause you haven't decided on a name yet, so I got him this.”

“It's probably just as well,” Rory says, gently lifting the tissue paper out of the bag. “Guys aren't really into the whole monogramming thing, are they?”

Luke chuckles and shakes his head. “Your mom and I are going to get you some other stuff - a crib and some clothes and blankets, things like that - but… this is from me.”

Rory reaches into the bag and pulls out the gift. “Oh, Luke,” she says, feeling unexpectedly teary.

It's a child-sized baseball glove.

“I just thought… I know you Gilmores aren't much for sports, and I know he won't be big enough to play for a while, but I thought that, you know, when he is… if it's all right with you, I could teach him how.”

Rory smiles tearily. “Of course.”

* * *

“You haven't decided on a name yet?”

“No.” She has a hunch, an inkling, but she wants to be absolutely sure, and she isn't. Yet.

“You're eight and a half months pregnant, Rory. The clock is ticking.”

“I know, Paris.”

“And are you getting adequate prenatal care? Because I've got all the best OB/GYNs in New York on speed dial.”

“Yes, Paris.” _A little bit on the late side for that, don’t you think?_

“A couple in Hartford, too, if your heart’s still set on that whole living-with-your-mother-and-stepfather-while-you-write-your-book thing.”

“My heart's not set on it,” Rory retorts, “it’s just the only practical option at the moment. I need support and a quiet place to finish my book. Stars Hollow has both in spades.”

“I'd hardly define your parents’ house as ‘a quiet place.’”

“It's quiet enough,” she sighs.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, fine.” Rory waves the question aside. “I just… I feel like my mother.” She meets Paris’s eyes. “I don't… I don’t feel like I'm living my own life, you know?"

Paris's eyes narrow. “How old are you?”

“Thirty-two. But what does that have to do with anything?”

“Did you or did you not graduate with honors from Yale?”

“I did, but--”

“Do you run an inn? Do you subsist solely on processed carbohydrates while somehow still maintaining the figure of someone who works out four times a week and eats like one of those Paleolithic nutjobs?”

“Well, no--”

“Do you have an obscene obsession with Lifetime movies? Is your relationship with your mother founded solely on your differences? Did you run away from home at seventeen?”

“Paris--”

“You're not your mother, Rory.”

“Paris!”

“What? Oh… my god. Your water just broke.”

* * *

She names him Richard.

Her grandmother has come down from Nantucket for the birth, full of characteristically acrid remarks about illegitimacy and the further tarnishing of the Gilmore family name, but they all fade away when Lorelai places him in Emily’s waiting arms.

“Richard, you say?” Rory’s grandmother’s voice is strained, and there are tears glistening in the corners of her eyes. “It’s quite a noble name.”

Rory watches the way her grandmother holds her son, and her heart swells. “Richard Lucas Gilmore.”

Emily’s head snaps up at this, but not before Rory sees her mother reach out to still Luke’s trembling hand. _In the end_ , she thinks, _it wasn’t a difficult decision to make at all._

“Not after his father? Or Christopher?”

If Rory weren’t so overcome with exhaustion, she’d be offended, for Luke’s sake. But she's just pushed an eight-pound human being through her vagina, so she’s feeling generous. “After the best two men I’ve ever known.”

From his perch in the chair by the window, Luke offers her a teary smile.

Emily gently places small Richard in Rory’s arms. “It’s a fine name,” she says, and she presses her lips to Rory’s cheek. “A very fine name indeed.”


End file.
